by Mat Nastos
It reinforced every hair-brained anti-government theory David Zuzelo had ever come up with and finally being able to see hard data proving him right had the man absolutely giddy.
Mal turned back to stare at his right hand with its knife-like finger still extended. Concentrating, a warm pulse moved down his spine and into his arms, and the finger shrank back down to normal.
Well, thought Mal, normal in only the most relative sense.
Watching the morning sun reflect off of the highly polished metallic plates of his arm, Mal wondered what Kristin would say when she saw what had happened to him. Had she even wondered what happened to him, or had she just run off and married the first guy she met with good enough credit to buy a house in the well to-do Valley neighborhood?
Anger spilled from Mal as he slammed his hand down on to the dash, sending spiderweb cracks throughout its length.
“It just ain’t right!”
“You’re telling me,” Mal was surprised at Zuz’s response, sure his friend hadn’t been paying attention—even his internal voice had revealed the vital signs of someone deep in concentration: deep steady breathing, delta brain waves at an even four cycles per second, heart rate at forty beats per minute. Mal made himself vow to forget the indications of increased blood flow to certain unmentionable areas of Zuz’s anatomy.
“Excuse me?”
Middle finger pushing his glasses back into place, Zuz continued without allowing his eyes to stop skimming the information steaming in front of them, “Yeah, No. You’re totally right. It ain’t right, man.”
Mal turned to face the man, a puzzled look on his face. “What ‘ain’t right,’ Zuz?”
Zuz looked up, finally realizing he was part of a conversation, “You know, what you were talking about. What the government did to you. I mean, most of the stuff I pulled out of your head is encrypted beyond anything I’ve ever seen, but what I can make out is nuts. Human modification, hit squads. It’s insane. I knew it, but I didn’t, you know, KNOW it. You know?”
“I was talking about Kristin, Zuz,” sighed Mal, head drooping in slightly exaggerated melancholy. Sure, he was a billion dollar cyborg killing machine now, but that didn’t mean he didn’t need a little compassion every once in a while.
“Oh, right,” said Zuz, still clueless. “Wait. What about Kirstin?”
Staring out through the dirty windshield at the home of his ex-lover not fifty yards distant, Mal stated flatly, “She’s married.”
“Aw, hell,” repeated Zuz, watching Mal fidgeting restlessly in the passenger’s seat. “What should we do now?”
Mal continued to stare at the house, ignoring the question posed to him. Ten seconds of silence passed. Fifteen. Thirty. The newly awakened cyborg soldier seemed frozen in place, locked on Kristin’s home just across fifteen feet of freshly swept asphalt road and three meticulously manicured front lawns.
Zuz grew increasing worried as his friend’s silence continued, with no signs of stopping. “Do you want to go to Denny’s and grab some chow? You haven’t eaten in God knows how long.”
No response.
No movement.
Sliding the laptop onto the dash, Zuz reached out with his right hand and gripped the warm metal of Mal’s organic metal shoulder, “Mal?”
Without turning his head, Mal spoke, “I have to see her.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea? You know. Looking like,” Zuz gestured wildly at Mal’s new appearance “…that.”
Mal spun around in the seat, doing a quick once over of the hoarder’s wet dream that was Zuz’s Nissan, and then smiled as his ran a nearly leering eye up and down the smaller man’s loose, gray sweatshirt that declared he was a “one man wolf pack.”
Fingers wagging, Mal ordered, “Give me your hoodie.”
The cyborg exited the car a few minutes later, living metal arms now covered to the wrist by the thin gray material of Zuz’s long sleeve shirt. Mal flipped up the hood to hide his face from any of Kristin’s nosy neighbors who might be out and about doing early morning chores. There was no need to bring attention to his visit to his ex-fiancée if he could help it—there was no telling what kind of trouble it could get her into.
“Stay low and keep an eye out for anything suspicious,” said Mal, shutting the car door as quietly as possible behind him as he began what felt like the longest walk of his life, forcing himself to walk slowly across the street and up to the front porch of the house the pair had been staking out for more than half an hour.
Standing in front of the large dark green door, Mal was done waiting. He had to find out what had happened in the year he had lost. He had to know why Kirstin had left him. Inhaling deeply, Mal rang the doorbell and tried to control the excitement and anxiety building in his gut. Listening to the sound of footsteps approaching the door had Mal convinced his living metal palms were sweating.
The sight of a female figure through the faux stained glass window of the door had him gulping out loud.
The door swung open on silent hinges and Mal’s breath was taken away at the sight of the only woman he’d ever truly loved. Kristin Meyer, now Kristin Meyer-Morrell, stood before him, half-awake, long blond hair still mussed from sleep, dressed in a comfy deep burgundy fleece robe that ended just high enough on her thigh to get his blood racing.
“Can I help…” recognition hit Kristin with the force of a hurricane, jolting her eyes from sleepy boredom to horrified shock to straight up fury in a heartbeat, “…you!”
Mal used the time to try and decide what the best way to greet his long-lost love would be.
“Hi, honey, I’m home,” was his final decision.
It wasn’t the wisest of choices.
Mal’s computer warned him of the spike in Kristin’s pulse rate and the rush of blood to her arm in more than enough time for him to block the jaw-rattling punch she threw at him, but better judgment prevailed and he let it connect.
“You bastard!” the pretty blond bellowed, crossing her arms tightly just below her rather ample bosom. “How dare you show your face here!”
Rubbing his chin where a decent-sized bruise was already forming from her fist, “Nice to see you’re still packing a mean right cross.”
Kristin cinched her robe tighter around her body and shot daggers at the cyborg. Even scrunched up in rage, Mal thought she had the most beautiful green eyes he’d ever seen.
“It was a left hook,” she corrected. “What do you want, Malcolm?”
This was going to be harder than he thought. She only called him “Malcolm” when she was getting ready to start throwing things or exile him out to sleep on the couch.
Mal decided to try his serious voice to help get things on the right track.
“Something’s gone wrong, Kris…I’m in trouble and I need to talk. I need to get some questions answered,” Mal said as earnestly as possible. “May I come in?”
Kristin moved to block his entrance to her home.
“You’re fine out here,” she glowered and gestured for him to get on with whatever it is he needed to do.
“Fair enough. I’m having trouble remembering things,” he begin. “Trouble remembering about us and what happened last year.”
“Go on,” Kristin’s foot started tapping impatiently. She wanted Mal to get to the point and get out.
“Why were you so startled to see me standing at your door?”
“To be honest, I half-expected you were going to find some way to kill yourself in the hospital after you broke off our engagement,” Kristin responded, her annoyance growing with every passing second.
“I broke up with you?” Mal spat out the words, unbelieving them, and grabbed his ex-fiancée tightly by the tops of her arms. “You’re lying! I loved you—I still love you, Kris. I’d never—!”
“You left me, Mal. YOU left me,” she snapped, her voice filled to overflow with venom and anger. “Let go, Mal—you’re hurting me.”
The dark red imprints of cruel organic metal fingers rema
ined behind long after Mal removed them. He couldn’t believe what Kristin was telling him, but the look in her eyes confirmed it was the truth and the realization sent him to his knees.
“Why can’t I remember?”
Mal started to drop his head into his hands—until he caught sight of them as the rising sun’s light hit their strange, moving metal bands and twisting cables and rage erupted.
Lighting fast, Mal’s arm whipped out and tore through the red brick planter lining on side of Kristin’s tiny porch, pulverizing it to powder and cleaving a tiny plumeria bush in half.
Seeing the fragile state her former lover was in, Kristin’s voice reached out tenderly, “My God, what happened to you?”
“Tell me,” Mal’s voice was a ragged whisper, barely audible. “Tell me, what happened.”
Kristin’s eyes narrowed, anger still welling up behind them. Mal caught her gaze and his eyes plead for her to help him. She signed and her face softened in resignation.
Pushing the door open behind her, Kristin gestured for Mal to follow her inside. The pair made their way to a bright kitchen, covered in pastels and light-colored wood fixtures, and sat down at a small table set back in a breakfast nook. The aroma of freshly brewed coffee filled Mal’s nostrils, but Kristin disappointed his taste buds by not offering him a cup.
Instead, she sat shock upright in the pale yellow chair across from him, hands placed flat on floral table cloth.
“You stopped writing me,” Kristin began slowly, unsure of what to say to the shadow of the man she once loved. “Just after you went overseas—to Iraq. You stopped writing and I didn’t know why. I sent letters, it felt like a hundred of them, trying to get you to respond. Begging you to write me back.”
A single tear wound its way down the side of her face causing Mal to reach out to comfort her. Kristin shied away, but he wasn’t sure if it was from his inhuman hand or from an old pain re-aggravated by his presence.
“I called the army, but they were no help,” she continued a bit stronger than before. “You were too busy protecting my freedoms to practice your penmanship, they said.”
“My unit was shot down over…”
“I know…now,” Kristin cut him off, her fist clenching at her side let him know it was her time to speak. “A month or so later, men from the government contacted me and said you had been brought home—that you were in the hospital. In critical shape, they said. I rushed down to the base to see you.”
She leaned back and closed her eyes, remembering.
“They took me to your room in the ICU…it was terrible. Your arm…” her eyes fluttered open and she paused, staring intently at the gleaming cybernetic replacement mounted to his left shoulder. “Your arm was gone. There were three men in suits with us in the ICU, they told me your helicopter had been hit with a surface to air missile—that you were almost killed. You’d lost your arm in the attack, suffered massive internal injuries. Wires and tubes covered your body, and a machine was keeping you alive. I hated the sound of that machine.”
“The government men said you were conscious and had asked to speak with me,” Kristin scowled. “They wouldn’t leave—they barely gave me room to stand next to you. They smelled of too much aftershave and cigarettes.”
“The men…do you remember their names?” Mal asked, intrigued at her mention of government suits.
Kristin rubbed her temple and Mal noticed a small scar just to the left of her eyebrow and her hair was a couple of shades lighter, and far shorter, than he remembered. It ate him up that she’d been forced to go through so much without him.
“I don’t remember their names,” she admitted. “But the tall one—the one in charge, I think—he had the palest blue eyes.”
Mal filed the fact away, for whatever good it would do him later, and told her to go on.
“When they finally let us talk, you told me we were through, that you didn’t have the time or patience to deal with my trivialities anymore and that nothing mattered anymore,” her voice finally cracked. “That I didn’t matter anymore.”
Kristin looked at Mal in the way only a wronged woman could. It’d been a year and she was still pissed off.
“And that was it. They escorted me out and a group of soldiers from the army came and removed your things from our loft. I never saw you again…until this morning.”
Mal nodded and looked around the room, trying to avoid her accusing stare. His eyes fell on a wedding picture held to the stainless steel refrigerator nearby. A man in a military dress uniform stood behind Kristin with a huge smile on his face.
“Is that your husband?” Mal asked.
Kristin was confused for a split second until she followed Mal’s gaze to the photograph. Her face brightened considerably as she looked at it.
“Yes. That’s Marc,” she replied. “We met a month or so after you vanished. It was love at first sight.”
“Fantastic,” Mal had problems hiding the sarcasm in his voice.
“At least he was there for me,” the anger returned. “He didn’t run away.”
The two locked eyes in a ferocious staring contest, neither one’s pride allowing them to look away.
Mal caved first, realizing none of this was Kristin’s fault. She was as much a victim as he was.
“I…I better go.”
“Yeah, you better,” Kristin’s nostrils flared and she jerked her head towards the door, indicating he shouldn’t let it hit him on the way out.
Mal’s world was in pieces as he made his way through Kristin’s home and back onto the street. Everything seemed to close in around him, blanking the world out—blanking out Zuz waving at him from the still-running automobile, blanking out the sprinklers going off all around him as he crossed a trio of lawns, and blanking out the annoying way his computerized passenger announced that Kristin dialed a cell phone registered to one Marc Morrell as soon as Mal had left. He barely noticed opening the passenger side door to the Nissan, or the way its edge dug a shallow groove into the lawn they were parked next to as he did.
Nothing mattered to the cyborg except getting far, far away.
“How did it go?” asked Zuz, already sure of the answer based on the look of utter defeat on his friend’s face.
Mal dismissed Zuz’s question and dropped down into the waiting car sear, exhausted.
“Let’s get out of here,” he barely had the energy to speak the words.
“Sure, sure, man,” Zuz nodded and put the car into drive. As the Nissan eased away from the curb and rolled slowly passed Kristin’s home, he asked, “Where to now?”
“It doesn’t matter anymore, just drive,” Mal watched as Kristin’s house, and his dreams of returning to his former life, faded into the distance.
CHAPTER 9
Mal had been silent for the entire ninety-minute drive back to Zuz’s garage in City of Industry, failing even to offer any sort of comment at the large sign on the junkyard hideout’s rusted steel front gate warning that “trespassers would be violated.”
Kristin’s words and her anger had drained all life from the cyborg soldier. Mal had thought he’d find answers to what had happened to him after the helicopter crash in Dahuk—that he’d find out why his memory was gone and, more important, why Kirstin was married to another man. And she had given him some of those answers, but for each one he received, five new questions seemed to emerge.
Why had he left her? It just didn’t make sense to him. Mal couldn’t imagine loving anything or anyone more than he loved Kristin. She was all he thought about every day he was deployed in Iraq.
Even more puzzling to Mal was how he went from being an ICU patient missing most of his internal organs, as well as an arm, to finding himself as a black-ops cyborg super-soldier acting as an assassin for a covert agency for the US government.
If he was honest with himself, it all sounded like the plot to one of those God-awful “B” horror movies Kristin used to make him watch every Saturday on the SyFy Channel. None of it seemed real.<
br />
When Zuz walked into the main area of the garage with a pair of coffee cups containing a thick, black substance barely above room temperature (eight-five degrees according to the electronic hitchhiker in his brain), Mal waved him off, snatched the silver and black laptop out of its resting place in an old “Super Mario Brothers” backpack, and plopped down on the old barstool positioned in front of the big iron worktable.
After banging on the keyboard for a few minutes, Mal stared at one particularly intricate set of code on the screen. Zuz took the cessation in work as an invitation to join Mal at the table.
“None of this makes any sense,” groaned Mal, exasperated.
“Dude, I know,” Zuz leaned forward and rotated the portable computer so he could better see what Mal was gazing at. “It looks like some sort of high end variation of the AES, probably needing a 256-bit key to access the information. Nothing I’ve got has been able to break it. If you give me enough time I might be able to use a quantum algorithm to crack it. Grover’s might do the trick, but we could be talking days or weeks.”
Zuz failed to notice the completely dazed look on Mal’s face.
“It’s a probabilistic algorithm, so we’d need to run it through at least a few times to verify the results.”
A living metal hand reached up and snapped the laptop closed.
Shaking his head, Mal said dejectedly, “I have absolutely no idea what any of that means.”
“The Grover algorithm for searching unsorted databases,” Zuz saw the look of total confusion in the cyborg’s eyes as his explanation continued to fly over Mal’s head. “Quantum computing? Lov Kumar Grover from Bell Labs? None of this ringing a bell?”
“The only Grover I know lives with Big Bird over on Sesame Street, Zuz,” sighed Mal. “And, to be honest, I was talking about the entire situation more than the mess you pulled out of my head.”
